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03 Jan 2012Damballa’s Fight Against Advanced Malware
Malware being out of sight and out of mind often creates the perception that risks aren't present. Just because there’s no perceived risk, doesn’t mean it’s not there. Heads buried in the sand over the real malware threat leads to breaches that most organizations aren't prepared to handle. Having worked on a project involving an APT infection, I’ve seen first-hand how ugly this stuff can get.Endpoint protection isn’t enough. Analyzing ...
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16 Dec 2011
AlgoSec & what happens when you don’t look for flaws from every angle
I recently had the opportunity to see how well AlgoSec's Firewall Analyzer performs in a real-world security assessment. Long story short, Firewall Analyzer found a weak password on an Internet-facing firewall that would've gone undetected otherwise. A traditional vulnerability scanner didn't find it nor did two different Web vulnerability scanners. Nothing was uncovered via manual analysis either.Only AlgoSec's Firewall Analyzer found the weakness...no doubt a flaw that would've been exploited ...
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12 Dec 2011
Why uninterruptible power supplies have higher quality than Web apps
I recently purchased an APC uninterruptible power supply for my office and noticed something peculiar in the packaging. It was a small piece of paper that says "QUALITY ASSURANCE TEST". It has the time, date, operator ID and other identifying information for the specific piece of hardware.As you can see in the image, this QA test sheet has 33 unique tests that were performed on the unit presumably before it ...
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09 Dec 2011
Reactive security at its finest
I've been hearing on the news about Georgia State University (@GeorgiaStateU) installing 50 new security cameras. No doubt, universities in downtown Atlanta (one of the highest-crime cities in the nation) are not fairing so well with security these days so somebody needs to do something, no?Well, Georgia State's solutions was to install more security cameras. Is this security theater at it's finest? Not totally, but it is security theater like ...
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07 Dec 2011
BitLocker, Passware…heads in sand everywhere!
Three times in the past three weeks. That's how many conversations I've had people who have blown off any sort of technical or operational weaknesses associated with Microsoft BitLocker when using it as an enterprise full disk encryption solution. They're well-documented. I highlighted these issues in my recent whitepaper The Hidden Costs of Microsoft BitLocker as well.I've said it before and I'll continue saying it: I've sung the praises of ...
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20 Nov 2011A new way to bleed
I was in New York City this past week for my final keynote and related presentations for our TechTarget & CDW information security roadshow. Wow, 10 cities in eight months - what a great way to end our year. Of course, being in New York I couldn't help but notice the *constant* coverage of the Occupy Wall Street protests that ended up turning a bit ugly on Thursday - the ...
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10 Nov 2011
Why compliance is a threat
Compliance as we know it is arguably one of the greatest threats to enterprise security. Here's why:It creates a heightened sense of self for those responsible for accomplishing a state of compliance.It can cost more to become "compliant" than it does to create a reasonably secure environment.It empowers government.All of the above create complacency and a false sense of security. Please tell me I'm wrong....
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08 Nov 2011
One of my pet peeves: relying on users to wipe out wimpy passwords
You cannot - and should never - rely on your users for complete security...yet they're often the first or last line of defense - sometimes both. I wrote about this a while back but it's a problem that's still rampant in IT so I had to bring it up again. It's probably my biggest pet peeves with security. Simply telling users that they need to select strong passwords on their ...
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21 Oct 2011
Users making security decisions is your Achilles’ heel
I recently came across some content in a book outlining the benefits of SSL. The author depicted a scenario where SSL is in place to help the user authenticate the server/site he's connecting to and if a certificate-related error popped up in the browser then the user would know that the site was malicious and (presumably) not continue on with the connection. This very situation is an example of how ...
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15 Sep 2011
Your organization vs. BP: what will faulty decisions lead to in your business?
Imagine a scenario where poor management, failure to take appropriate action, personnel changes and miscommunication about who's responsible for what leads to a catastrophic event at your business? That's exactly what the findings were of the BP oil spill.Sadly, 11 people died because of this incident. Luckily, our line of work isn't quite so risky but your business can still get in a bind when information security is mismanaged.Here's a ...
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Resources
Client Testimonials
“A business associate referred our company to Principle Logic when we were seeking a resource to perform vulnerability /penetration testing for our external and internal networks. We found Kevin Beaver to be professional, well informed, and easy to work with. His testing did not disrupt our networks, and his progress updates were timely.
His final report was very thorough and included security recommendations for our network environment. The executive leadership was so impressed with Kevin’s security expertise, they have extended their agreement to continue to perform periodic testing. We highly recommend Kevin Beaver and Principle Logic as a resource for network security testing.”
(IT managed services firm)
Kevin has written/co-written 12 books on information security including one of the best-sellers of all time:
